Tickets punched: Warhawks men, women in Final Four

STEVENS POINT—The UW-Whitewater men’s basketball team will get a crack at its second national championship in three years.

Junior guard KJ Evans scored 21 of his game-high 27 points in the second half on Saturday, where the Warhawks dominated in a 74-51 thrashing of Emory University in an NCAA Division III national quarterfinal game.

Evans, a Beloit Memorial High graduate, made 10 of 17 field goals and 7 of 10 free throws. He also added 11 rebounds to lead Whitewater back to the Final Four.

The Warhawks were eliminated in the first weekend of tournament play last year after winning it all in 2012.

Whitewater shot just 38.5 percent in the first half against Emory and trailed by one point at halftime.

Everything shifted from there, as the Warhawks wore down a team that needed overtime to beat host UW-Stevens Point, the No. 1 team in the nation, in a Sweet 16 game one night earlier.

Whitewater held Emory to just one basket in the first six-plus minutes of the second half as the Warhawks grabbed the lead and never looked back. Emery was 8-for-25 from the field in the second half, including 2 of 10 from beyond the arc.

Evans nearly outscored the entire opposing team in the second half by going 7 of 10 from the field. He helped the Warhawks double up the Eagles in the paint, outscoring them 48-24.

Point guard Quardell Young added 12 points and six rebounds for Whitewater, which will play in the Final Four at Salem, Va., beginning Friday night.

Whitewater faces Illinois Wesleyan at 5 p.m. CT. Both teams are 27-4.

Amherst and Williams will play in the other semifinal at 7:30. The winners will meet for the national championship game at 5:30 p.m. Saturday.